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Pottstown Plating Works Inc.
Pottstown Plating Works Inc. (PPW) is a family-owned electroplating shop operating in Pottstown, Montgomery County, providing copper, nickel, tin and zinc plating services to the automotive, appliance, electronic, construction, furniture and hardware industries. PPW's goal to reduce hazardous waste by 80 percent was achieved by the development of several plant-wide strategies. One priority focuses on recycling process water. Wastewater from various rinse streams is reduced from 250,000 gallons per day to an average of 100,000 gallons per day. Wastewater normally discharged to the local publicly-owned treatment works is diverted to be reused as alkaline cleaner rinse water. Water that typically went to waste treatment is reused. Treatment chemicals of pH adjustments were significantly reduced due to improved use of rinse water. The company now saves $150,000 per year in water costs and $50,000 per year for treatment chemicals. Hazardous sludge generation has been reduced considerably because less water had to be treated. Since 1989, hazardous waste generation has been reduced from about 640 tons to less than 200 tons per year. This generates an annual cost savings for hazardous waste disposal. PPW reduced health hazards by eliminating the use of some plating chemicals including cadmium cyanide. The company has reduced alkaline chlorination used to treat the cyanide by half. Instead of the normal process of landfilling metal hydroxide sludge, substituting acid chloride zinc for cyanide cadmium plating enables former waste to become a resource to send out for reclamation. Trivalent chromium used for clear chromate conversion coatings on plated parts replaces the more toxic hexavalent clear chromate.
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Pottstown Plating |
